Before evening the place, considering all things, was fairly habitable.
Madame Lelanne brought down the great stove from the hut; and breaking a
pane of glass in the barred window, they fixed it up with its chimney and
lighted it. From time to time the turmoil above them would break out
again: the rattling, and sometimes a dull rumbling as of rushing water.
But only a faint murmur of it penetrated into the cellar. Towards night
it became quiet again.
How long Joan remained there she was never quite sure. There was little
difference between day and night. After it had been quiet for an hour or
so, Madame Lelanne would go out, to return a little later with a wounded
man upon her back; and when one died, she would throw him across her
shoulder and disappear again up the steps. Sometimes it was a Frenchman
and sometimes a German she brought in. One gathered that the fight for
the village still continued. There was but little they could do for them
beyond dressing their wounds and easing their pain. Joan and the little
chemist took it in turns to relieve one another.
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